Louisiana Police Apologize For Using ‘The Purge’ Siren For Curfew

Pandemics are a staple of dystopian fiction, as are images of empty, deserted cities like the ones we see almost every day on social media thanks to quarantine measures caused by the coronavirus. Life doesn’t need any help feeling like a bad sci-fi movie right now.

No wonder then that Louisiana residents were so disturbed when police in Crowley, Louisiana recently used the distinctive siren sound effect from The Purgefilms — a franchise about a dystopian future where all crime is legal for one day out of the year — to signal the start of a nightly local curfew at 9PM. When the police were alerted to the origin of the sound, they issued this statement to local TV station KATC, promising not to use it anymore:

Last night a ‘Purge Siren’ was utilized by the Crowley Police Department as part of their starting curfew. We have received numerous complaints with the belief that our agency was involved in this process. We were not involved in the use of the ‘Purge Siren’ and will not utilize any type of siren for this purpose.

You can hear the audio for yourself in the video below:

To date, The Purge series has spawned four films and a television series, all about a world where a political party called the New Founding Fathers of America install the Purge as an annual ritual after the United States is devastated by an economic depression. A fifth Purge film was due in theaters later this summer. It will almost certainly be delayed by the coronavirus pandemic. When it does finally open in theaters, let’s hope it doesn’t look like a documentary.